Hi
Sitting here reading through the manual on my SmartSolar MPPT 100/20, I came across this:
● Mount vertically on a non-flammable substrate,....
It's on page 5 in the manual if anybody wants to check it out. I understand the vertical mount. You want air to move past the heatsink fins. Mount it flat or horizontal and the heatsink is much less effective. It's the second part I sort of don't get.
If you look at teardown pictures of the converter, it's just got very normal semiconductors in it. They die a bit over 100C junction temperature. Getting the heatsink above 100C is just about impossible without toasting the insides of the device. At 100C, you aren't going to do any damage to plywood or particle board. Where does the "non-flammable" thing come from ?
Just to be sure that *somebody* actually follows the manual, I went on YouTube and watched a few videos. Sure enough, if it's a Victron video, they are mounting the beast on metal or something that looks like cement board. It's not just a non-flamable surface. (like foil over wood). It's a non-flamable substrate.
If it's really going to get up to >200C on the mounting ears, the body will be way above that. I'd think there would be a high temperature wire requirement as well .... Even fairly good insulation only gets a 105C label on it.
I'm wondering if this is some sort of crazy lightning / lawyer thing. Bolt hits the solar panel and vaporizes everything between there and ground. It all goes up in a big ball of metal vapor and flames. Since the Victron was on a block of cement ... it's not what burned down your house sir. It must have been the wires to and from the unit ....
Free beer to anybody who can find video of one of these things setting a wooden wall on fire
Note: I most emphatically do not believe that there is some voodoo in the Victron units that is any different than what everybody else does. If theirs need a magic mount, everybody needs a magic mount. I'm also not suggesting that everybody go buy a block of concrete to mount their solar controller on. I very much don't understand where the requirement comes from.
Bob